Can Baydarol
The main motivation for writing this essay stems from the remarks made by Barrack, the US Ambassador to Turkey and Special Representative for Syria, to President Erdoğan just before he meets with US President Trump at the White House: “He wants legitimacy, let’s not disappoint him, let’s give it to him!”
The first question we must ask is, ‘Who is sovereign?’ As far as I recall from Mümtaz Soysal’s “Introduction to the Constitution” lecture approximately 45 years ago, for all monotheistic religions, the sole sovereign is God. The problem arises at the point of who legitimately represents this sovereignty on earth.
In Islamic tradition, naturally, it is the prophet and the caliphs who follow him; in the Christian world, it is the Pope, that is, the Vatican.
The struggles and wars waged throughout the ages for the legitimacy of sovereignty far exceed the theological and historical knowledge of the author of these lines and are too broad in scope to be covered in a single attempt.
However, from the time Yavuz Sultan Selim ended the Mamluk state in 1517 and assumed the caliphate, until its abolition by law on 3 March 1924, the caliphate remained within the Ottoman dynasty. From this final date onwards, it must be acknowledged that the Republic of Turkey, with its secular approach, recognises that sovereignty does not derive from heaven but is subject to the will of the people.
In the Christian world, there are indications that the conflict was primarily driven by self-interest. The Vatican administration, which presented itself as the sole representative of sovereignty on earth, had attained unparalleled wealth through its sales of the promised paradise in the afterlife and the power it wielded. In response, Martin Luther and Jean Calvin established Protestantism in 1529, almost simultaneously with Yavuz Sultan Selim’s seizure of the caliphate. Their ideas were actually simple. Of course, the Pope is the sole representative of sovereignty on earth.
However, for this sovereignty to be used most effectively, the principle of expediency must be taken into account. This approach, which later emerged as decentralisation and was also referred to by lawyers as the ‘substitution of authority’, was reflected in the 1993 Maastricht Treaty (the treaty establishing the EU) as the “principle of subsidiarity”, but central governments were reluctant to transfer a significant portion of their powers to the Brussels authority.
Naturally, we must add the Orthodox Church as the third major denomination alongside the Catholic and Protestant denominations that we have divided into two, and address the issue of ‘ecumenism’ in this context. However, as mentioned above, the author of these lines does not possess sufficient theological or historical knowledge to make such assessments.
Returning to Barrack’s remarks about granting “legitimacy” to Erdoğan.
This approach naturally caused significant reactions in Turkey. The warm images presented with the US President prompted many questions about whether legitimacy was gained from the US. In particular, it remains unclear what the US gained and what Turkey received in return in the tit-for-tat negotiations, the content of which we still do not know, and it seems likely to remain unclear for a long time.
However, this inevitably raises a series of peculiar questions. Will the Trump regime henceforth act as the representative of a new religion for the entire world, serving as the source of legitimacy? In other words, is Trump God’s new image on earth? Is the legitimacy granted to Erdoğan a kind of new caliphate, in line with the principle of exercising authority at its most effective point? Again, are the words uttered by our President’s wife, Mrs Emine, when answering a question some time ago, “Well, being a caliph isn’t easy, of course!” merely limited to a reflection of family discourse? What is the real goal of a regime that is so distant from Atatürk and his revolutions?
Although Barrack later backtracked and stated that ‘Of course, the Turkish people’s will determines legitimacy!’, unfortunately, my trust in him has been at zero since the moment he attempted to disregard the Treaty of Lausanne.
Do you trust Trump and Barrack?